Oil Filter Question

[Guest Rex C]

Accompanying is a picture I took of my oil filter this morning on my 1938 D8 Touring Sedan. As I said in a previous post, Dodge Brothers cars and antique cars in general are pretty new to me.

 

How does one go about changing the oil filter on this car? This canister appears to be sealed unless I'm missing something. I don't see a way to change an oil filter element or originally did you have to buy one of these canisters every time you changed it?

 

I know I'm asking elementary questions for the folks here but I'm just trying to learn,

 

Thanks in advance.

Edited August 29, 2016 by Rex C (see edit history)

[jpage]

Your car probably came with a sealed oil filter which was commonly used on WPC cars of that period. You have to replace the filter with a new unit if you can find one.You might try e-bay or one of the Mopar parts guys or maybe one of the old NAPA stores might have one still in stock. They were available new but have recently gone obsolete. The other alternative is to replace the filter with a canister type unit which should be easy to find, then you only have to replace the cartridge inside, but even those are getting harder to find as the manufacturers keep dropping old items.

Edited August 29, 2016 by jpage (see edit history)

[ply33]

Rex C, The filter in your photograph was designed to be thrown away and an brand new canister installed. The last major manufacturer of those was WIX and they stopped making them about 15 years ago. You can still find old stock on places like eBay. And Roberts Motors website indicates they still sell them.

 

If you are going to eBay, then you might consider a filter like the one jpage shows that takes a replaceable element you can get at your local auto supply. There were a number of manufacturers of those and the elements they take vary slightly so you might want to check the availability of elements. Also, if you are going with the Chrysler OEM type, there are two variations that I know of: A heavy duty one that takes a "sock type" filter element and a standard duty one that takes a paper type element.

 

This is a bypass filter system so there are a couple of big differences with what you are familiar with that mean that you don't have to change the filter every oil change.

 

On a full flow filter system as typically used in new cars, if the filter media clogs up the engine is starved for oil. To avoid that there is a bypass valve built into the filter which is supposed to open if the pressure across the media becomes too much. If that happens then you inject a lot of junk into the engine. You don't want that to happen and you can't tell how full the media is, so the only safe thing to do is replace the filter at every oil change.

 

On a bypass filter system, if the media becomes full then oil simply stops going from the main engine oil gallery out through the filter and back into the pan. As a result, you can wait until the filter becomes clogged before replacing it. The manual for my '33 talks about removing the outlet fitting when the engine is at hot idle and verifying that clean oil is coming out. It is easier to simply place you hand on the filter and see how hot it is. If it is just at the average temperature of things under the hood it is probably clogged. If it is very hot, then it is probably fine. Or you can follow the other original recommendation of replacing it every 10,000 miles.

 

If replacing it at 10,000 miles then in my case with an average of 2,000 miles/year I'd need to replace it about every 5 years even though I to oil changes at least yearly. Robert's current price for filters is $45.0 so that works out to about $9.00/year which is not a big deal in my book. So I've been keeping the original style filter on my car but I've also purchased a few extra so that if they become even harder to find, I will be okay for a long time to come.

[Guest Rex C]

Thank you both gentlemen. I have since stumbled across Roberts Motor Parts and talked to Gary Roberts. I think for now, at least I will get one of the $45.00 ones from him. As you said ply33, $9.00 a year sounds like a very reasonable cost.

 

jpage, that certainly is a beautiful setup on yours.

 

Thank you both again.